In Wildest Africa 



-♦s 



again you may happen upon them standing under trees ; 

 and when this occurs you may hope for good results, 

 because the way in which the blue rays of light are 

 reflected from the trees has a favourable effect upon 

 the bromide-silver plates. 



While it is true that there can be nothing more 

 disappointing than the discovery, when developing one's 

 photographs of animals in a country like Africa, that 

 negatives of which one had great hopes are no good, 

 this very possibility adds to the fascination of the work, 

 and is, as it were, a link between the sport and that of 

 our fathers and grandfathers. The kind of rifle-shooting 

 we go in for nowadays has nothing in common with that 

 of the hunter who was dependent upon a single bullet 

 the effect of which he could only get to make sure of 

 after long experience. To the true sportsman the camera 

 is the best substitute for the old-fashioned gun, inasmuch 

 as it involves very much the same degree of difficulty 

 and danger. 



How keenly I regret that I had not the advantage 

 from the first of the perfected photographic apparatus 

 that has come into existence as the result of long ex- 

 perience ! I look back with regret upon the many 

 failures I experienced in my earlier efforts, the ex- 

 citement of the moment often causing me to neglect 

 some necessary precaution. Lions, rhinoceroses, hippo- 

 potami, giraffes, and antelopes innumerable — nearly all 

 my attempts to photograph them were fruitless. When 

 I came to develop the negatives at night-time I would 

 find a blurred suggestion of the objects I had seen so 



676 



